


rhythm of a wild heart

by holtzmanns



Category: RuPaul's Drag Race RPF
Genre: Canon Compliant, Developing Relationship, Fluff, M/M, brooke is Stressed, non-au, set during the magic show episode
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-04
Updated: 2019-05-04
Packaged: 2020-02-23 19:08:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18708169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/holtzmanns/pseuds/holtzmanns
Summary: “Hey. I see your head spinning already. Don’t go there, baby.” Vanessa’s voice is uncharacteristically soft.Based on Brooke's comments from the Roscoe's viewing party - "He was like my safe space, so like when I would get stressed out and stuff, I could go and he would give me a hug and a kiss."





	rhythm of a wild heart

Brooke overthinks things.

It’s in his nature, and it’s what’s gotten him this far. He’s used to striving for perfection in fields where perfect doesn’t exist, where there’s always room for improvement. It’s given him a work ethic rivalling that of an Olympic medallist, but also a mind that doesn’t let him rest. One that concocts scenarios that outline all of the areas where he’s going wrong, where he can do better, how he’s _not enough-_

But it works.

He has ridden his tendency towards perfectionism to principal roles in ballet, winning fucking Miss Continental, and now to national television with the world watching his every move.

It’s exhausting sometimes, all of the overthinking. He’s tried to find an off switch for it before, taking vacations from his work to calm the voices in his head that are always on the run. Doing so only makes them spiral more, latching onto possible areas for missteps like vine tendrils _(there’s so much to do and not enough time, you can’t rest, go back to work)._

So, Brooke works. He makes it onto the show where he stresses over each challenge like it’s going to be his last. The voices in his head are still there and draining, telling him that he can’t rest until he’s prepared enough to be able to do each challenge in his sleep. He learns the lip-sync song each episode _just in case_ he hasn’t done enough, not accepting that he’s made it to another week until he’s standing safe at the back of the stage. And then the entire cycle begins again the next morning.   

The swirling thoughts are draining but they have gotten him this far, so who is he to complain? He accepted long ago that things are always going to be this way. He’s always going to have this feeling of not doing enough, not being enough. He just wishes that it exhausted him less.

His brain tires him out again the evening before the magic challenge. He’s gone in circles with Nina and Shuga all day, trying to find a way to combine their talents into a script that’s actually entertaining. They’ve second-guessed all of their decisions, rewriting over and over again until the words in the pages start to blur together.

They’re all still on set, waiting for the van to take them back to the hotel for another night of fitful sleep and dreams that detail all the ways the challenge the next day could go wrong. His mind has tuned out Nina and Shuga beside him as they fret over one of the magic tricks. He’s trying to use his dance background to come up with some choreography, any presentation skills to pull their performance together. He’ll make them practice tomorrow morning until their show looks nothing short of professional. It has to.

“Hey.”

There’s a hand on his shoulder, and he looks up to see Vanessa’s inquisitive face studying his own. She looks as exhausted as he feels, after the long day of filming followed by hours of practice off camera.

Brooke wordlessly pulls her into a hug, her head fitting perfectly under his chin as she buries her face into his chest. It hits him, as it always does, how they fit together like puzzle pieces. How kissing the top of her head and comforting her helps calm down the heart beating out of his chest, too.

Vanessa lifts her face to look up at him, raising a hand to smooth the crease that’s formed in between his eyebrows. He feels the tension he didn’t even realize he was holding drop under her touch.

“How’s your team faring?” Brooke barely finishes asking the question before Vanessa’s face wrinkles, indicative of a frustrating day.

“It’s just tough, y’know?” she sighs. “Trying to please them all is harder than winning the fucking lottery or some shit. Silky and A’keria want to wing it, Miss Yvie is over here hemming and hawing and writing out a full script without consulting anyone first. I’m feeling like a mother hen trying to control all her wayward chicks.”

He snorts at the mental image, remembering loud, argumentative noises coming from her group’s side of the room more than once during the day. “Too much personality, huh?”

She groans. “Picking the loudest bitches aside from myself was not the smartest shit to do, let me tell you.”

He tilts her chin up, placing a soft kiss on her lips.

“You’ll kill it. You’re funny, you’re magnetic. I’ve seen you practicing your trick a million times today already.” He wants to convince her with more than just empty words; he wants her to believe them too.

She smiles at his attempts at reassurance. “How’s your group?”

Brooke is rambling before he even realizes it, telling her about their uncertainties and complete lack of decision-making ability, and how all of them want to fall back and have someone else lead the group. He walks her through their tricks, all the dropped props and the stumbling and the magic abilities that have not quite come together yet.

“Tucking panties? Y’all are nasty.” Vanessa’s face wrinkles at his description of Shuga’s tentatively planned trick, and he laughs despite himself at her reaction.

“Hopefully both nasty _and_ funny.”

He’s not sure if he’s trying to convince Vanessa or himself. What happens if they’re not? What happens if he falters and he messes up the bubble trick? What if he brings his team down and they’re judged in _groups_ and suddenly he’s in the bottom, potentially sending one of them home for his mistakes or going home _himself-_

“Hey. I see your head spinning already. Don’t go there, baby.” Vanessa’s voice is uncharacteristically soft. She tugs on his hand, stepping even closer into his space. “You can’t plan for things that haven’t happened yet. Don’t be making up those scenarios with the bad juju.”

“I’m not,” he says weakly. She only raises her eyebrows at him in response until he sighs. “Okay, maybe a little.”

It surprises her every time when she catches the moments that his anxious thoughts start to take over him. He’s used to keeping everything inside, his metaphorical brick wall giving off a façade of calm and fearlessness and keeping his emotions safely inside. He’s used to being an ice queen, to everyone else believing that everything he does is effortless and confident.

Vanessa is the only one who can catch the wavering in his eyes every time that his mind starts to crumble, sending him glances across the workroom throughout the long filming days. It’s no different now, with her standing in front of him.

Brooke sees the gears turning in her mind, trying to come up with something to distract him. It doesn’t take her long. “Silky said to me and A’keria that she got the PA on her hotel room floor to bring her Taco Bell last night. And she didn’t even order a Crunchwrap Supreme!”

A corner of his mouth turns up at that. “I don’t know, you always strike me more as a Dorito taco fan.”

“Ooh bitch, don’t even go there.” She makes a face. “Dorito taco shells are fucking nasty. I need me a good classic Crunchwrap. I don’t know how Silky did it, though. I tried asking the PA on my floor for Gatorade last night and she brought chocolate milk instead! I mean I’m not pressed about it, I fuckin’ love chocolate milk, but what part of that screams Gatorade? Do you think she has a bias against Gatorade? What did the Gatorade family ever do to her?”

She rambles on at him for ten more minutes, making him crack up every so often despite his mood, until the van arrives and all of the queens pile in.

The two of them end up in the back row on their own. The van has become less crowded as every episode passes and more and more queens continue to go home. It’s nice, the extra room, but also unnerving when he compares it to the first few days of filming when fifteen of them were squished together like sardines in a can.

Vanessa leans into his side easily once they sit down, pulling one of his arms around her shoulder and grabbing his hand with both of hers. They’re quiet, watching the cars on the highway pass outside their window. The fingers of his free hand trace patterns on her shoulder.

He feels safe. She’s his safe space, his place to let go and just _be._

Brooke doesn’t know how Vanessa does it every time, how she can take the anxious ramblings that have an iron grip on his brain and distract him with her laugh and soft kisses.

The swirling waves in his mind are quieter now. He’s not thinking about the challenge anymore, but rather about how her breathing has synced to his and how he never wants this van ride to end, the way it does too soon every day when they have to part at the hotel and head for their individual rooms.

Vanessa slides out of his arms reluctantly once they get to the hotel, not wanting to separate from him either. Brooke wishes that he could just pull her with him into his own room, bringing her close and not having to let her go at all.

They walk slowly behind the other queens, as if it’ll make their time together last longer. They ignore the PA calling both of their names (" _the elevator doors are going to close, hurry_ up" _)_ as they eventually shuffle in.

Vanessa squeezes his hand in the elevator. “We’ve made it through all of the episodes so far. We’ll make it through this one too, and we won’t stop till I’m lip syncing you for the crown and I win, bitch.”

She winks at him when the elevator dings at her floor, sauntering out but not before blowing him a kiss. Brooke smiles despite himself, ignoring the knowing look that Nina is shooting his way beside him.

He doesn’t know what will happen tomorrow, if his group will be able to pull themselves together in time and put on a magic show that won’t end in disaster. He does know that he has _her_ , and that somehow - despite his anxious mind - she makes him feel sometimes like that it’s all that matters.

**Author's Note:**

> Endless love to @beanierose for editing this and convincing me that it was okay. 
> 
> Find me at @plastiquetiaras on tumblr.


End file.
